Cyprus Mail: News Articles in English, 98-10-08

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From: The Cyprus Mail at <http://www.cynews.com/>

Thursday, October 08, 1998

CONTENTS

[01] `Tourist drunk at time of jet-ski death crash'

[02] 'Squaddies have repented'

[03] Hercus hails productive contacts in Athens and Ankara

[04] Two more remanded over suspected gangland plot

[05] 'Bomb' was in fact arson

[06] More special police for Limassol

[07] Bishop probe should be over in two months

[08] Rolandis insists EAC board must resign

[09] New co-operation plan to combat thalassaemia

[10] Pensions to rise in January

[11] Cyprus economy still strong, IMF told

[12] 2,000 children referred to psychologists last year

[01] `Tourist drunk at time of jet-ski death crash'

THE DUTCH tourist who killed a British woman when his jet-ski rammed into hers on Tuesday was nearly twice over the drink-drive limit, a Larnaca court heard yesterday.

Alfred Post, 28, from Bolsward in Holland, was remanded in police custody for three days on suspicion of reckless driving, causing death, and driving a jet-ski under the influence of alcohol.

British tourist Karen Isabel White, 32, from Bitterne in Southampton, died instantly when the jet-ski driven by her husband Greg, 25, collided with Post's jet-ski off the coast of Ayia Napa.

Famagusta CID investigating officer Yiannos Kapnoullas told the court that Post was almost twice over the legal limit when he was breathalysed two hours after the crash.

The officer said the suspect's blood alcohol level was 60 milligrams. The legal limit is 39 milligrams.

And Kapnoullas suggested that the suspect had rammed into the British couple's jet-ski despite a frantic warning by the couple for him to stop.

"At some point the husband was forced to stop his jet-ski to clean his goggles. He then saw the Dutchman coming in the opposite direction. The British couple tried to flag him down or get him to change direction," Kapnoullas told the court.

"But he didn't stop and crashed into the jet-ski, killing Karen."

Karen White, 32, was confirmed dead on arrival at a private clinic in Ayia Napa on Tuesday night. She suffered fatal injuries to the chest during the head-on collision with the other jet-ski.

Her husband Greg miraculously escaped unscathed.

"It all happened very fast, we tried to get out the way but he went into the side," the grieving husband said from his Ayia Napa hotel yesterday.

Post was treated for severe shock at a private clinic in Ayia Napa and kept under police guard until his court appearance yesterday.

Famagusta CID are also investigating whether the suspect presented a driving license before hiring the jet-ski, as is required by law.

There were a series of jet-ski accidents during the summer, in which tourists suffered serious injuries.

Fears about the dangers of jet-skis and water sports in general were raised just over a month ago by Famagusta district judge Marios Georgiou, when he sentenced a British tourist for crashing into a banana boat and putting two British women in hospital with multiple fractures.

"The uncontrolled use of high-powered vessels like jet-skis, which are particularly dangerous, noisy and disruptive, should not be allowed," Georgiou said, calling for tighter regulations during the court hearing on August 19.

Briton David Whitworth, 22, from Barnsley, received a six-month jail sentence suspended for three years and a £500 fine for reckless driving and hiring a jet-ski without a licence.

The charges faced by Post carry a maximum sentence of two years imprisonment and/or a £2,000 fine.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[02] 'Squaddies have repented'

THREE British soldiers appealing against life sentences for the killing of Danish tour guide Louise Jensen have assumed responsibility for their actions, a defence lawyer yesterday told a session of the Supreme Court.

"The fact even now that they have dropped an appeal against their conviction is an indication of repentance and assuming responsibility for what happened that night," defence lawyer Antonis Andreou said during yesterday's appeal hearing.

On Monday, lawyers abandoned an appeal to try and overturn the convictions, deciding instead to concentrate on having their clients' sentences reduced.

When the appeal opened at the Supreme Court last May, the three ex-soldiers were aiming to walk free by overturning their convictions on legal technicalities.

Yesterday, proceedings got under way with defence lawyers arguing against the criminal court's decision to impose sentences of life without remission on manslaughter convictions.

Justin Fowler, 30, from Falmouth, Alan Ford, 29, from Birmingham and Geof Pernell, 27, from Oldbury in the West Midlands, were jailed for life without remission in March 1996 for the 1994 abduction and manslaughter of Jensen.

"I have looked at all the decisions of the Supreme Court after 1992, and despite the existence of some horrific crimes I have not encountered any other manslaughter case where life sentences were imposed; the maximum was 15 years," said Andreou, who represents Pernell.

Andreou said he could only find one criminal court decision where a manslaughter conviction had secured a jail term beyond 15 years.

"There is only one case, which was in 1967 when a person was convicted for 25 years on manslaughter charges," said Andreou.

Legal arguments are focusing on the length of the sentence, which the defence lawyers describe as "excessively harsh" and "unprecedented" for a manslaughter conviction.

In 1992, the Supreme Court ruled that life meant life in Cyprus.

The defence also argued that the criminal court did not take into consideration the drunken state of the trio as a mitigating circumstance nor the fact that it the prosecution had failed to prove who actually dealt the fatal blow.

"The court convicted them under articles 20 and 21 of the criminal code (which covers aiding and abetting) but they were convicted as instigators," said Andreou.

Andreou went on to say that no hard evidence was put forward during the criminal trial which showed that his client, Pernell, had come into any contact with the victim.

"The conviction of the accused (Pernell) was based on blood stains found on his shoes, which were questioned by an expert," said Andreou.

During the prolonged criminal trial, one of the most expensive in legal history, the three soldiers declined to testify and their police statements were submitted as evidence.

Jensen was sexually assaulted and brutally beaten to death with a spade after being abducted from a petrol station in Ayia Napa on September 13, 1994.

Her naked and battered body was found two days later in a shallow grave, a few hundred yards away from a local police station.

The appeal hearing continues tomorrow.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[03] Hercus hails productive contacts in Athens and Ankara

UN DEPUTY Permanent Representative Dame Ann Hercus will soon begin her shuttle diplomacy to try and revive stalled intercommunal talks, she said yesterday.

Speaking on her return to the island from a visit to Athens and Ankara, Dame Ann said she had hand "very productive" and "very useful" talks which she believed would facilitate her planned talks with both sides.

While in Athens and Ankara, Dame Ann met Greek Foreign Minister Theodoros Pangalos and his Turkish counterpart Ismail Cem.

"Both visits were very productive as I now have direct contacts in Athens and Ankara," Dame Ann said. "In both capitals I had very useful discussions which provide a positive perspective for my efforts."

The shuttle talks with President Clerides and Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash will begin soon, according to Dame Ann, but she stressed negotiations talks would take place behind closed doors and out of the public eye.

"I note there has already been a lot of speculation before the talks have even started, which I find frankly unhelpful," Dame Ann said.

Hercus reiterated a statement made by the UN Secretary-general in New York on September 30, in which she is mandated to develop a process for on- island contacts with the goal of reducing tensions and promoting progress towards a just and lasting settlement. Dame Ann said yesterday the Secretary-general believed the process would best be undertaken away from media spotlight.

"Mr Clerides and Mr Denktash completely agree with this view, so please don't expect me to break rules agreed by the Secretary-general, Mr Clerides and Mr Denktash," Dame Ann said.

The government yesterday warned that if the Turkish side tried to push for a confederation during the shuttle talks, then the reaction of the Greek Cypriot side would be swift.

Government spokesman Christos Stylianides said President Clerides expected clarifications at the first meetings on the reduction of tensions and security issues.

Referring to the Turkish side's proposal for confederation, Stylianides said: "Once more, the Turkish Cypriot side is trying to revoke events and facts as these have been shaped within the framework of the Security Council, the UN Secretary-general and the joint statement of the foreign ministers of the permanent members of the Security Council."

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[04] Two more remanded over suspected gangland plot

Kyriacos Sinesis from Kofinou and Giorgios Xiourouppas, 29 from Larnaca, appeared before a Limassol court yesterday after their arrest late on Tuesday. They were remanded for eight days.

Two young women arrested with the suspects were yesterday released without charge.

Two other men - Theodoulos Sinesis and Pavlos Kouilis - had been arrested and remanded earlier on Tuesday.

The latest arrests crowned a successful police operation that led to the discovery of what police believe to be two gangland murder plots. A sports bag containing 100 cartridges and believed to be linked to the case was also found on Tuesday night.

Police still want to question another man, named as Andreas Giorgiou Sinesis, in connection with the case.

The operation began on the night of Monday to Tuesday when police gave chase to a car spotted behaving suspiciously in the Limassol village of Kolossi. The car, driven by Theodoulos Sinesis and Kouilis, was followed into the city, and police saw the two handing three packages - later identified as automatic weapons - to the passengers of a black BMW. The men brought before the court yesterday are understood to have been the recipients of the guns.

Police arrested Theodoulos Sinesis and Kouilis on the spot, but lost trace of the BMW, which was yesterday found abandoned in a cul-de-sac near the Ayios Ioannis refugee houses in Limassol.

The three automatic weapons have not yet been found and police were yesterday combing through area between Ypsonas, Kolossi and Erimi. An earlier search had revealed the sports bag with the cartridges under a bush in Ypsonas.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[05] 'Bomb' was in fact arson

Police initially suspected that a bomb had gone off in the enclosed parking area on Androcleous Avenue at around 10.30pm, causing extensive damage to a Mazda MX6 and another vehicle. But after examination by police explosives expert Antonis Shakalis and other officers it was found that the Mazda had been set alight using flammable liquid.

The noise which had been assumed to be a bomb blast was apparently the Mazda's boot bursting open due to pressure caused by the heat.

No one was injured by the fire, which was put out by the Nicosia Fire Department.

Investigations are continuing.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[06] More special police for Limassol

The decision was announced yesterday by Justice Minister Nicos Koshis after a meeting of the Council of Ministers.

The policemen are expected to be sent to Limassol in the next few days as part of measures to make the town less vulnerable to crime.

"After the acquittal of the Aeroporos brothers, there has been some tension, " Koshis said, referring to the release of the three brothers who had been charged with the attempted murder of Antonis Fanieros. Andros Aeroporos was subsequently murdered in Limassol.

"We are now in a better position," he confidently concluded.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[07] Bishop probe should be over in two months

Speaking after the Council of Ministers yesterday, Koshis also said he would be meeting with Archbishop Chrysostomos later in the day.

The President of the special investigative committee researching the allegations on behalf of the Holy Synod, Elias Pantelides, yesterday said his work had been completed with Tuesday's submission of the committee's 1, 700-page report to the Archbishop.

"The objective difficulty we had was the fact that some people with whom his Excellency (Bishop Chrysanthos) had worked since 1996 did not want to meet with us or make a statement," Pantelides said. "I am speaking especially about some person with the name Nina (Petrou), and her absence has not helped us in the slightest."

Pantelides was also present at the meeting between Koshis, Attorney-general Alecos Markides and Chrysostomos late yesterday afternoon.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[08] Rolandis insists EAC board must resign

Speaking after yesterday's cabinet meeting, Rolandis said he found the Board's 350-page apology insufficient.

The EAC board sparked controversy when it purchased Church land for its Limassol headquarters at well over the market price. Rolandis later intervened to force the cancellation of the deal.

A decision was not reached on the future of the Board yesterday, as not all Ministers had had the opportunity to read the apology and were therefore unable to vote on the issue.

A special cabinet meeting is scheduled for Monday when a decision is to be made.

Speaking on allegations of improper use of funds during renovations at the Nicosia Hilton Hotel, Rolandis said the issue should be cleared by the end of this month. He said the Council of Ministers had every right to order the Hilton board's resignation, as the Hilton is a limited company, in which the government has an 80 per cent stake.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[09] New co-operation plan to combat thalassaemia

A SON of Cyprus came home yesterday to cement ties between the island and Australia that he hopes will one day produce a cure for thalassaemia, a genetic blood disorder afflicting some 600 Cypriots and hundreds of thousands of people worldwide.

Dr. Panos Ioannou held court at the Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics yesterday for the signing of an agreement between the Institute and the Murdoch Institute in Melbourne, Australia, to allow the sharing of expertise against the illness.

Ioannou, 47, was chosen earlier this year to head the Gene Therapy Group at the Murdoch institute. Key to his selection was his pioneering work in thalassaemia prevention and treatment over the last 20 years in Cyprus, which has been at the forefront of medical efforts to combat the genetic disorder.

His work included establishing the Prenatal Diagnosis Laboratory for thalassaemia, first at the Cyprus Thalassaemia Centre, and later at the Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics.

With this background, it was natural that genetic research into the causes and possible cures for the disease would become a major research focus of the Murdoch Institute.

Armed with Murdoch's deep pockets and its cutting-edge technologies, Ioannou said he hoped to engineer a "technology transfer" from his Australian laboratories to the Gene Therapy Group being set up at the Institute of Neurology and Genetics.

This will involve not only country-to-country co-ordination of gene therapy research into thalassaemia, but also invitations to Cypriot scientists to hone their genetic-engineering skills against the ailment by training at the Murdoch Institute.

Ioannou said he made the painful decision to leave Cyprus for Australia because he felt current "prevention strategy (involving prenatal diagnosis) combined with abortion, is not the final solution for thalassaemia."

"Abortion is not ethically acceptable to many families" faced with having a child with the life-wasting disease, "and not the logically acceptable solution to the problem," he said.

However, he said advances in understanding human genetics could well produce experimental cures "within 10 years." These, he insisted, would only be experimental, and nowhere near marketable on a mass scale.

Such "cures" might involve removing bone marrow cells from an afflicted foetus, or those of a person already stricken by the disease; manipulating the cells chemically or physically; and reinserting the treated cells into the bone marrow stem cells.

Far from being a needle-in-a-haystack search - "there are three billion elements in a person's genetic code" - the procedure operates at only the molecular level, and is already being used to treat some cancers and genetic diseases, Ioannou noted.

And pharmacological "cures", he continued, could involve the use of laboratory animals to produce medicines either to correct the genetic defect causing thalassaemia, or to neutralise its effect on the body.

Without treatment, a person afflicted with thalassaemia - which prevents the body from eliminating iron from the bloodstream - would not live beyond five or 10 years of age, Ioannou said.

However, current treatment permits Cypriots and others afflicted to live into their 40s, he said, adding that current prevention techniques had reduced the island's thalassaemic birth rate to some 70 children per year.

This equates to a birthrate of about "one per thousand population," he said.

"Without prevention, the number could be one in 60 births per year" in Cyprus alone, he added.

The disorder afflicts about 100,000 newborns each year worldwide, according to World Health Organisation (WHO) figures Ioannou cited. Its victims are found mainly throughout the Mediterranean and Middle Eastern regions, through the temperate and tropical zones of Africa, and into Southeast Asia and Central China, he said.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[10] Pensions to rise in January

But while this was good news for the island's pensioners, who have long been calling for a rise in pensions, Petsas warned that many self-employed workers were paying less in social insurance contributions than they should.

Speaking after a meeting of the Social Insurance department's treasury council, of which he is also president, Petsas said that of as many as 40, 000 self employed people, between 13 and 14,000 were evading full payment of their contributions.

"To this end, our goal is for the self-employed to pay on the basis of their real income," he said.

Three amendments have been proposed to solve the problem. First, it has been suggested that the current ten professional categories be replaced by 28 better-defined ones. Secondly, that the monitoring of the income of all categories be increased; and finally that a change be made to the social insurance law giving the director greater powers over people's contributions.

Petsas also said that in 1997, the department had registered an income of £372 million, and had paid out £211 million in pensions and benefits.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[11] Cyprus economy still strong, IMF told

But whatever the IMF and the World Bank do to try to aid those economies as they fight the "Asian Flu" pandemic that began in Thailand last year, spread throughout Asia to Russia, and now threatens the Western industrialised nations, "one thing is clear," Christodoulou told the banking leaders:

"There must not be competitive currency devaluations and a retreat toward protectionism, policies which proved to be self-defeating in the 1930s," when the Great Depression strangled the world's economies and left tens of millions of people jobless.

Cyprus' economic fundamentals are "relatively strong," and the government is meeting "four of the five convergence criteria of the Maastricht Treaty, " Christodoulou said, referring to the Republic's ongoing accession talks to the European Union.

"Real GDP has been increasing at an annual rate of around 4.5 per cent, and the rate of inflation is in the 2.0 per cent range," he noted.

However, he added, the "unfavourable experiences of a number of countries in liberalising their external capital accounts and financial markets too quickly have made the Cyprus authorities cautious in freeing up our markets to harmonise our policies" with EU countries.

In this regard, he said, Cyprus has welcomed the advice of IMF staff and executive directors concerning "liberalising our external capital account."

Consequently, he said, the Cyprus House of Representatives in coming weeks will consider "a package of taxation and government expenditure-restraint measures aimed at fiscal consolidation."

And, he added, the House will also soon consider "a bill proposing the removal of the interest rate ceiling," currently fixed at nine per cent.

As the Asia-spawned financial pandemic continues to spread, the ability of the IMF and the World Bank to respond adequately and quickly to financial crises and their economic and social repercussions "needs to be enhanced," Christodoulou said.

But just when IMF coffers are all but bare from the huge payments it has made to Asia's ailing economies, and to Russia - and now Brazil seeks a $30- billion IMF bail-out - prospects that the 45 per cent increase in IMF capital, pledged to be in place by early 1999, "have become less favourable, " he noted.

This remark was an oblique reference to foot-dragging by the US Congress in refusing to pass legislation needed for the United States to make an additional $18 billion contribution to the IMF.

Nonetheless, "Cyprus will continue to support and co-operate with the Fund and the Bank in their efforts to foster a stable economic and financial environment conducive to growth and development," he said.

Thursday, October 08, 1998

[12] 2,000 children referred to psychologists last year

Of the 2,140 pupils seen by the Ministry's ten resident psychologists during the year, 69 per cent were new referrals and 31 per cent re- referrals from previous years. Of the total, 67 per cent were boys and 33 per cent girls.

Just over 12 per cent of children were referred from pre-primary schools, 51 per cent form primary schools and 32.8 per cent form secondary schools; 2.5 per cent were from special schools and 1.7 were children not attending school.

According to the figures, half of the children seen did not have any obvious signs of being mentally disturbed, but 43 were suffering from a form of psychosis and 25 from neurosis.

But an Education Ministry spokesman said yesterday the majority of the children referred were cases of dyslexia and speech problems, emotional problems, hyperactivity and problems with authority or disruptive behaviour.

He said most children referred were helped within 12 months and did not need re-referral the following year.

© Copyright Cyprus Mail 1998

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